UK also issued (another) notice requesting providers supply more today
https://www.current-news.co.uk/news/national-grid-eso-issues...
Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
61–70 of 146 posts
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#62There's no single "Europe" grid.
There isn't a single grid, but there is a large synchronous grid covering most of continental Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchronous_grid_of_Continenta...
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#63Time to start deploying big batteries across the grid at substations. A shipping container here and there would work wonders.
I want to get rooftop solar and a battery pack for my house. But I really don't want to a lithium battery attached to my house. I feel like there'd be a good business in selling battery 'space' in a big fire proof box down the street that I could then offset my meter against. Wouldn't even need to be in my street if I could get the offset.
I get where you are coming from, but my car is already a ~50 kWh lithium ion battery in my garage, so I'm already living with that fire risk. I just wish I could use my car to power my house when there's a power outage, it's a big enough battery to last for a couple days even when it's at half charge.
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#64Yet governments insist newbuilds to be on electric heating... I was saying this won't be nice for a long time. Example: my house, a 1954 built semi-detached - the official average unit in England - has a single phase 100A main cutout. Hob 32A, 2x sockets circuits 2x16A, 2x light circuits 2x6A, oven 16A. That's already 92A at total theoretical capacity. If I was to add FIR panels, that's bare minimum +32A, plus water…
> Yet governments insist newbuilds to be on electric heating
Not only that, but they insist that almost all vehicle transportation should be electric in maximum 10-15 years.
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#65Am I naive in assuming that many grid stability issues could be fixed by mandating all electric heaters automatically cut off at, say below 49.9Hz? It is my understanding that modern home EV chargers have the capability to do this to some extent, but I'm not sure if it's actually utilised?
The term in the industry for this is "demand response," and usually it's voluntary and customers should get paid for participating. Typically it's just larger customers that can reduce demand on a very large scale. In the US there are a few startups that are aggravating residential customers into larger groups, so that each of thousands of households cuts consumption by a few hundred watts, so that the aggregate drop…
For rapid response systems grid frequency is the signal!
You always need something that can respond quickly to unexpected events to maintain grid stability. The best signal for that is grid frequency, as it’s a very direct measure of grid health.
Many of those large consumers you speak off will be contracted to respond directly to grid frequency, either shedding load or adding supply, to make sure the grid doesn’t completely collapse if a shock event happens. That buys grid maintainers the time they need to recover the grid in a more controlled way.
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#66France seems to have problems generating enough electricity for the current winter demand. https://www.lefigaro.fr/conso/electricite-pour-eviter-des-co... https://www.connexionfrance.com/French-news/People-in-France... Britain, too: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/britains-national-grid-issues-warn... German press reports about cold temperature and of not enough nuclear power online in France. Reason: maintenance backlogs…
It's also more than ususally cold here in Barcelona, and many people have electric heating (inefficient but rarely needed).
I don't know what I'd do if the power fails :S I have UPS power backup for my servers but not for heating obviously (that's way too much power for batteries)
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#67France seems to have problems generating enough electricity for the current winter demand. https://www.lefigaro.fr/conso/electricite-pour-eviter-des-co... https://www.connexionfrance.com/French-news/People-in-France... Britain, too: https://uk.news.yahoo.com/britains-national-grid-issues-warn... German press reports about cold temperature and of not enough nuclear power online in France. Reason: maintenance backlogs…
While true, it's very unlikely to be the reason for what we're seeing here (a sharp drop at 14:05), it's most likely related to a plant failure (likely a nuclear / hydro plant) somewhere in Europe. Edit: according to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25685833 it means that there's more than 4GW went missing, which rules out a hydro plant failure and make nuclear plant failure unlikely (only three plants, all of th…
Indeed, it's too sharp.. I wonder if we'll find out what happened.
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#68Romanian news are screaming about several counties (like 1/5 of RO) being blacked out and this being a problem at the interconnection with the neighboring power grids. From the little I know about power lines, events like this can cascade to half a continent.
High voltage fluctuations today. Instead of 220V we got down to ~165V. Internet outages on top (I assume some hardware failed since multiple counties were affected on the RDS network). Edit. Here's a power graphic: https://www.transelectrica.ro/widget/web/tel/sen-grafic/-/SE... Seems Romanias production fell under the consumption at around 15:30 Water fell at that time, so maybe some hydro was shut down? We did have…
> Water fell at that time, so maybe some hydro was shut down?
That was my first reaction on /r/romania, too, but some commenter in there suggested that maybe the hydro power production went down as a result of the network not being available (no reason to "pump in" electricity if there's no available network to transport it).
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#69Yet governments insist newbuilds to be on electric heating... I was saying this won't be nice for a long time. Example: my house, a 1954 built semi-detached - the official average unit in England - has a single phase 100A main cutout. Hob 32A, 2x sockets circuits 2x16A, 2x light circuits 2x6A, oven 16A. That's already 92A at total theoretical capacity. If I was to add FIR panels, that's bare minimum +32A, plus water…
> Yet governments insist newbuilds to be on electric heating Not only that, but they insist that almost all vehicle transportation should be electric in maximum 10-15 years.
They should install FTTH while they're upgrading everybody's electrical service. :)
Re: Europe: close to power grid blackout (49,74Hz power line frequency)
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Most grids have a rapid response system like this. They’ll have contracts with very large power consumers (think big hydro pumps, metal smelters etc) that can afford to have their equipment power down without notice in exchange for energy rebates. Then when the frequency drops these consumers will automatically turn off their equipment to reduce power draw. The seeing such a huge drop like this is extremely unusual,…
Apparently first threshold for cutting of hydro storage pumps below 49.85 Hz was undercut very briefly. Immediately afterwards the frequency reaches that threshold again, so I assume those measurements were working as planned. Below 49Hz larger consumers would be cut off in steps of ~10% of the network load. AFAIK this includes large industrial consumers who are legally required to have the equipment in place to allo…
Industrial consumers will have a contract to be part of first tier load shedding, rather than a legal mandate.
If the grid really needs to shed load, it doesn’t ask, switchgear will just be programmed to physically disconnected consumers at certain grid frequencies. As a consumer you should have equipment that can survive that if it’s important to you, the consumer can then normally get rebates for loss of service later.
Special locations like hospitals are normally the last to be load shed, and the surrounding grid will shed everyone else first, before disconnecting them.